The long path of the liquidation of public employees towards a partial return to an ordinary condition will cost 3.1 billion over ten years: in which the severance pay arrives immediately after retirement, without the expectations imposed since the public finance crisis of 2010-11.
It is a figure far lower than the cyclopean sums written in the estimates brought by the INPS to the Consulta in the rich dispute on the subject, which calculated up to 15.6 billion to be dedicated to the immediate cancellation of the delaying mechanisms in force today. But be careful: the maneuver, in line with the appetizer served last year, deals exclusively with old-age retirements. And even so it generates a cost that can only be managed on a slow path: in the hope that it will be enough to stop the trap of unconstitutionality, which would require an immediate all-out intervention bringing the maxi costs indicated by the Social Security Institute back into play.
The new mechanism
It is precisely from the multiple requests of the judges of the laws that the progressive and partial overcoming of the payment in installments in the PA arises. The new rule, as explained in the Sole 24 Ore last Saturday, moves in two stages: in the first three years, starting from 2028 due to the absence of margins on 2027, it reduces by three months a year the time that passes from retirement to the crediting of the first installment of the severance pay, already lightened from 12 to 9 months by the last law of budget. From 2031 it then moves on to deal with the amount threshold, today at 50 thousand euros, beyond which the installment payment starts, raising the ceiling to the initial tranche of 10 thousand euros per year until it is canceled from 1 January 2035. At that point, pensioners who have reached age or service limits will have their payment recognized immediately, like private sector employees. The others don't.
Final verdict on January 14th
The maneuver is silent on those who will leave office due to seniority, or perhaps because they find work in the private sector. And it therefore leaves the current calendar unchanged, which in these cases makes you wait 24 months for the first installment and then pays out the severance pay in annual installments with a maximum value of 50 thousand euros each, until the third which closes the accounts regardless of the amount. These end-of-service payments exceeding 100 thousand euros will therefore continue to be expected for five years (often lengthened by other administrative obstacles).
The new rules will return to the tables of the Constitutional Court on January 14, the date on which the final hearing on the topic has been set to give the Government time to intervene. That day it will be understood whether the countermeasures of the budget law will be sufficient to avoid a declaration of unconstitutionality which, without interventions, would have been inevitable.
Delicate balance
The issue has in fact been in the balance for a long time. Already in 2019 (sentence 159) the judges had underlined the urgency of reviewing legislation "not without problematic aspects". In 2023 (sentence 130) they returned to the topic, asking for "priority reform intervention". Which, however, did not arrive until the ultimatum of March 5th (order 25), which set the date for January 14th 2027, when the final verdict will arrive. There the judges will be asked to walk a delicate balance. Because severance pay, regardless of the reason for leaving work, is always deferred pay, and enjoys the constitutional protections of article 36; but decisions cannot ignore another crucial constitutional good, represented by the balance of public accounts.
